Topic: RUMOR: Castlevania 3DS made by MERCURYSTEAM

[uzo]

I would kill for a Treasure Castlevania game.

SCV4 is about as close as you'll get to that.

[thernz]

And we all know how that turned out.

[ganonfloyd]

SCV4 is about as close as you'll get to that.

Well I suppose I can live with that and just be happy with what they did with Gradius.

[Mikepjr]

I think i rather see IGA and so forth make a CV game for the 3DS... i was not nuts at all with the Castlevania game MS made at all...it disappointed me a bit..
I think it was the music... . nothing felt CV enough for me...

[Valtiel]

That's already happening... right now. I don't know why people keep reiterating the same stuff over 'n over "CV needs to change," it's been changing since 2008.

I see your point, maybe I should say "other new blood".

But the new people working on the game are still under the influence of the "old" directors. That is suffocating the saga. LoS is cool and all and the best CV experience I've had in years, but the 2D legacy HAS to live on and can give much more to the saga (and gamers, since we don't get games like that anymore) and it should be made in Japan, because CV is a saga that is strongly rooted in the japanese style of gaming.

Basically Konami should outsource CV.... in Japan. Either to a new Konami team that has NOTHING to do with the old ones, or to an outside company, or to Platinum Games, whatever.

They just need a Japanese Mercurysteam for the 2D games.

[shelverton.]

Basically Konami should outsource CV.... in Japan. Either to a new Konami team that has NOTHING to do with the old ones, or to an outside company, or to Platinum Games, whatever.

I would actually love to see WayForward make a classicvania. Contra 4 was excellent - both faithful to the series roots while at the same time making the game feel new and fresh. I believe there are some really passionate retro gamers working at WayForward. They would definitely treat a 2D Castlevania with the utmost of respect.

[Valtiel]

I also disagree with the sentiment that CV wouldn't need a "major overhaul".
What should happen to the series in my opinion right now is either:

A) Super Steroidvania: The Comeback

Basically the CV we know and love, on steroids. Play it safe - make a 2/2.5D side scrolling action platformer, and perfect it. Make it HD, with some gorgeous hand-drawn graphics that would make Secret of Mana cry in shame. Roid up the platforming - look at Super Meat Boy and all the cool 2D platformers recently released, and make it an intense experience. I'm talking about a toolset and level design that allows us to see Hans-Axel Belmont running then sprinting then sliding under a collapsing roof only to roll and jump and grab to the opposite wall with his chain then pulling in and sliding down the wall only to backflip in a closeby opening. Nonstop. For hours.
Take the combat and make it FINALLY exciting - put in parries and dodges and combos and build in a 2D version of a Kamiya game. Let us juggle enemies and throw them into other ones with our chain, let us parry and counterattack, backflip behind mobs and use 5 different, input based moves for each subweapon. I'm talking about being able to throw your daggers at mobs, using them after a timed dodge to stab a monster in the eyes and stun him, throw them at weak points to build temporary grappling points for our yet unupgraded whip, throwing them during a jump to pin a monster in place for a few seconds and so on. Take a cue from MS and build context sensitive moves - whip grab a small enemy and pull him to yourself or throw him on someone else, or whip grab a boss and pull yourself in for a kick in its ugly face.

There's an UNIVERSE of things to do with 2D sidescrollers. They could take the classic formula and amp it up in hundreds of ways. Get rid of whoever thinks that reusing assets and changing the magic subsystem makes each game unique, and rebuild the legend from scratch.

B) Streets of Vania, aka The Legend of Vania: A Belmont for the Future, aka Red Dead Vania

Plan B: screw sidescrollers. 20 years of Castlevania, was a great ride, let's move on.
Make a Castlevania action RPG. Heck, make a CV turn based RPG if you need. A sidescrolling beat'em up in the vein of Knights of the Round. A 3d "sandbox" game where you start in your small Transilvanian village and keep unlocking new areas a la Assassin's Creed/Ocarina of Time, with real time traversal on horses and carts, a Van Helsing sidekick building you anti-monster gear as you progress through the game, a diversity of locations and enemies leading to the final confrontation in Dracula's Castle (that has been looming over your village since the first minute of gaming, thanks).



I'd be fine with either outcome, to be honest.

The thing that has me the LEAST excited at the moment is the eventual announcement of a 2D sidescroller that is just like SotN except magic this time buffs your weapon this way and not that. Oh and everything else is the same. It's been like this for 13 years now.

[Viper]

Contra 4 was excellent - both faithful to the series roots while at the same time making the game feel new and fresh. I believe there are some really passionate retro gamers working at WayForward.

It was quite good, but i can't see anything "fresh" in it. It looked more like a bunch of parts from previous contra titles.

Let us juggle enemies and throw them into other ones with our chain, let us parry and counterattack, backflip behind mobs and use 5 different, input based moves for each subweapon. I'm talking about being able to throw your daggers at mobs, using them after a timed dodge to stab a monster in the eyes and stun him, throw them at weak points to build temporary grappling points for our yet unupgraded whip, throwing them during a jump to pin a monster in place for a few seconds and so on. Take a cue from MS and build context sensitive moves - whip grab a small enemy and pull him to yourself or throw him on someone else, or whip grab a boss and pull yourself in for a kick in its ugly face.

You definitely won't find a budget to do something like that in 2D.

[Ahasverus]

I only need Castlevania V.

[DragonSlayr81]

I see what you did there! LOL!

Though yeah, it's probably been long overdue for a Castlevania V! I can probably tell you this, the mere mention of "Castlevania V" will make people curious. Say what you will about Sonic 4, be the physics wonky and it playing more like an Sonic Advance game, but when it was first unveiled, the mere mention of it being the FOURTH installment made people hopeful for the most while whispering in their mind(to themselves), "It's about FUCKING TIME!!". It would be like if we got a REAL Super Mario Bros 4(no subtitle attached). Things like that draw attention because a lot of people like a classic numbered lineup. But other than that, eyes are going to look, so it's up to the companies to bring their game on.

[shelverton.]

It was quite good, but i can't see anything "fresh" in it. It looked more like a bunch of parts from previous contra titles.

Well, "fresh" was maybe the wrong word here, but the game felt new even though it's so faithful to the oldschool Contras. Maybe it was because Contra hasn't quite been itself since 1994 so it felt great to finally go back to the roots. I honestly dunno where you'd draw the line between a game that is faithful to its roots, and a game that is "a bunch of parts from previous contra titles". Contra is Contra. Of course WayForward could've thrown everything Contra out the window and created something totally different, but they decided not to. For me, it felt like a TRUE sequel to the Contra games I grew up with, not a rehash. It's definitely not quite as over-the-top as Hard Corps, but is more like a sequel to Contra III. The double screen didn't feel gimmicky but actually added to the gameplay. So Contra 4 was a fresh breath of air for me, in all its oldschoolness.

[SIRHardle]

Make a Castlevania action RPG. Heck, make a CV turn based RPG if you need.

I actually did a turn based semi-metroidvania/rpg castlevania game, that worked better than I expected. Plus I got enough support to actually start working on a sequel with expanded features and so forth.

I still dream with a true 3D SOTN-esque game. Tons of resources for you character, a gigantic castle full of uniquely interconnected areas, a good customizable combat system, tons of exploration, fantastic soundtrack etc, etc... Dunno, we would need a mix of Naughty Dog + Santa Monica Studios + Platinum Games to come up with something like that.

[Joachim]

with some gorgeous hand-drawn graphics that would make Secret of Mana cry in shame.

That's.. kind of an odd selection. Why Secret of Mana? It was a decent game, sure, but graphically speaking it was never anything special.

[SIRHardle]

Oh I can guarantee you it was. Before Secret of Mana nothing like that was ever done in RPG land, not only the scale, magnitude and vibrancy of the graphics and size of the sprites + all other aspects. SoM came before FFVI, Chrono, SSFII, Metroid, DKC etc... and many other games who really tested the SNES capacity in 1994.

By today standards I think Legend of Mana graphics and Odin's Sphere / Muramasa would be more in this league.

[SomaCruz90]

Well, "fresh" was maybe the wrong word here, but the game felt new even though it's so faithful to the oldschool Contras. Maybe it was because Contra hasn't quite been itself since 1994 so it felt great to finally go back to the roots. I honestly dunno where you'd draw the line between a game that is faithful to its roots, and a game that is "a bunch of parts from previous contra titles". Contra is Contra. Of course WayForward could've thrown everything Contra out the window and created something totally different, but they decided not to. For me, it felt like a TRUE sequel to the Contra games I grew up with, not a rehash. It's definitely not quite as over-the-top as Hard Corps, but is more like a sequel to Contra III. The double screen didn't feel gimmicky but actually added to the gameplay. So Contra 4 was a fresh breath of air for me, in all its oldschoolness.

I love Contra 4, but it feels like a "Contra Greatest Hits", like the ultimate tribute to Contra and the first three games. "Hey, remember the first game where you drop out of a helicopter, ninja flip over exploding bridge, fight these football player looking guys, and then battle a wall? Where here it is again! And now there's that waterfall stage with the big headed alien boss again! And here's those Contra 1 hallway stages!" etc. Not that riding a giant missile while fighting a giant robot isn't awesome or anything, because it totally is.